The only thing that promoters and
opponents of large-scale confinement animal feeding operations (CAFOs) agreed
on is that CAFOs invariably create conflicts in rural communities.The CAFO promoters accuse the opponents of being
emotional, uninformed, radicals, opposed to modern agriculture and to progress
in general. The opponents accuse the CAFO promoters of being insensitive, self-seeking
bullies, unconcerned about the rights other people in the community.
Eventually, virtually everyone in the community lines up on one side or the
other of these arguments. Over time, those on one side lose all sense of
commonality or community with those on the other. Everywhere CAFOs become a
significant public issue, the social fabric of rural communities is ripped to
shreds.

CAFOs are invariably promoted to
communities as a logical rural economic development strategy and the only means
of maintaining a viable local agricultural economy. CAFOs invariably are
opposed by community members because of concerns about
noxious odors and pollution of streams and groundwater – which ultimately are health
concerns – and about the impacts of CAFOs on the overall quality of life in
their communities. Local public officials are invariably put in the
uncomfortable position of trying to decide whether any potential economic
benefits of CAFOs are worth the ecological and social costs.

The promoters of CAFOs tend to target
communities that are desperate for economic development, although they may later
branch out into surrounding areas. Local leaders are told that the CAFO will
add to local employment and the local tax base. The effects of increased local
spending for buildings, equipment, feed, and feeder livestock are supposed to
multiply as they ripple through the community, resulting in additional
expenditures for groceries, clothes, housing, automobiles, healthcare, and
other consumer necessities. Increased property tax collections will then pay
for better local schools, roads, and other public services. The promoters claim
that the CAFOs are a natural result of our free market economy. If they don’t
locate here they will just locate somewhere else, local farmers will be denied
an opportunity to succeed, and the local community will be left without an
agricultural economy.

Initially, most opponents of
CAFOs are concerned about the inevitable odors caused by the huge quantities of
livestock manure generated by CAFOs. However, as they begin to learn more about
CAFOs, they become aware of other environmental risks – pollution of streams
and aquifers with biological wastes and the human health risks associated with
air and water pollution. They also become aware of growing concerns about the
higher risks of E-coli O157:H7 and antibiotic resistant bacteria, including
MRSA, and even “mad cow” disease associated with CAFOs. As local opponents begin
to communicate with those in existing CAFO communities, they become
increasingly concerned about the potential impacts of CAFOs on the overall quality
of life in their communities. They also begin to challenge the economic claims
of CAFO proponents, because people in other communities have been made the same
promises and they have proven to be empty.

Such community conflicts were
understandable in the early days of contract livestock production, while the
ultimate impacts of large-scale CAFOs on rural communities were still largely
unknown. Earlier socioeconomic research had focused on the negative impacts of
large, industrial agricultural operations on traditional diversified farming
communities.[1] We
know now that CAFOs are the epitome of industrial agriculture. But, most of the
earlier studies had focused on crop production and there was no proof that the earlier studies were also
relevant to large-scale confinement animal feeding operations.

Today, however, there is no
legitimate reason for these conflicts to continue. Virtually every study done
on the subject in the past 20-years has confirmed the inevitable negative
community impacts of CAFOs suggested by earlier studies. The research had
consistently shown that both the social and economic quality of life is better
in communities characterized by small, diversified family farms.Even in cases where larger, specialized
farming operations have brought more jobs and total income to communities, they
have also brought greater inequity in income distribution. The rich got richer
and the communities got more poor people. The economic benefits went to a few wealthy
investors, the new jobs were lower-paying than existing jobs, and communities
were left with fewer middle-income taxpayers to support the community. The only
studies finding anything positive about CAFOs are those that focused solely on
their aggregate economic impacts, while ignoring the negative impacts of income
inequity on overall quality of life in communities.

A 2006 study commissioned by the
North Dakota Attorney General’s Office provides a review of 56 socioeconomic
studies concerning the impacts of industrial agriculture on rural communities. It
concluded:“Based
on the evidence generated by social science research, we conclude that public
concern about the detrimental community impacts of industrialized farming is
warranted. In brief, this conclusion rests on five decades of government and
academic concern with this topic, a
concern that has not abetted but that has grown more intense in recent years,
as the social and environmental problems associated with large animal
confinement operations [CAFOs] have become widely recognized (italics
added). It rests on the consistency of five decades of social science research
which has found detrimental effects of industrialized farming on many
indicators of community quality of life, particularly those involving the
social fabric of communities. And it rests on the new round of risks posed by
industrialized farming to Heartland agriculture, communities, the environment,
and regional development as a whole.”[2]

Among the problems associated
with increasing income inequity were changes in the social composition of
communities. Increasing numbers of poor immigrants in communities, regardless
of their ethnicity, bring fundamental changes in
the social composition and structure of communities. This typically leads to
increasing social conflicts in schools, increased crime, and more family problems.
A community “class structure” often emerges, or is amplified, in which some
people are accepted as equals within the community and others are not. As a
result there is typically a decrease in participation in community social and
civic activities and less loyalty to local businesses – the community loses its
sense of community and its ability to function for the common good. When some
few people benefit at the expense of the community as a whole, it seems to
violate an important rural ethic that destroys the sense of community.

Any
tax benefits resulting from increased economic activity are more than offset by
increasing public expenditures for schools, law enforcement, and social
services, in addition to the increased costs of maintaining roads and bridges
due to increased truck traffic hauling feed and livestock to and from CAFOs. The
research verifies that most of the promised increases in tax revenues never
materialize, as most of the jobs go to people from outside the community and
CAFOs spend relatively little for feed or other operating needs within their local
communities. I have not found a single
case where local property tax rates have been reduced or local public services
have been improved as a result of CAFOs choosing to locate in a community. Perhaps
most compelling, there is not a single community where CAFOs represent a
significant segment of the local economy that is looked to by other communities
as a model for rural community development.

With respect to the opponents’
arguments, a growing body of scientific evidence has confirmed that the health
and environmental concerns associated with CAFOs are justified. Those who continue
to deny the existence of sound science indicating significant human health
risks are either completely misinformed or have a concept of science that is
simply too narrow to address the actual
health risks of CAFOs. Some CAFO proponents admit that numerous scientific
studies have found evidence of health risks but point to other studies that have
found no significant linkage between CAFOs to human health. For example, a 2004
Government Accounting office (GAO) report concluded, “Antibiotic-resistant
bacteria have been transferred from animals to humans, and many of the studies
we reviewed found that this transference poses significant risks for human
health.”[3]
The USDA, an ardent proponent of CAFOs, responded to the draft report by
suggesting that the conclusions of existing research on the issue was not
conclusive, and suggested that the GAO include more studies that questioned the
significance of the linkage of antibiotic resistance to CAFOs. The GAO
responded, “We found that only a few studies have concluded that the risk is
minimal, while many studies have concluded that there is a significant human
health risk from the transference.” The
Center for Disease Control was even sharper in its rebuke of USDAs comments.

In calling for a nationwide
moratorium on CAFOs, the American Public Health Association cited more than 40
scientific reports indicating health concerns related to CAFOs.[4]
The citations include research from such prestigious institutions as the
University of North Carolina Medical School, the
University of Iowa Medical School, and the Johns Hopkins School of Public
Health. In testifying before a U.S.
congressional committee, the Director of the Johns Hopkins School of Public
Health cited scientific evidence concerning the contamination of air, water,
soil, and foods with toxic chemicals, infectious diseases, antibiotic resistant
bacteria, and E. coli 0157:H7.[5]
A prestigious commission funded by the Pew Charitable Trust concluded in their
2008 report, “The current industrial farm animal production system often poses
unacceptable risks to public health, the environment and the welfare of the
animals… the negative effects of the system are too great and the scientific
evidence is too strong to ignore. Significant changes must be implemented
and must start now.”[6]
The preponderance of scientific leaves little credible doubt that CAFOs
represent significant environmental and health risks to rural residents. The
only remaining question is whether rural people have the right to do anything
about it.

Rural communities are at a
critical point in their history. Many rural communities today are being asked
to sacrifice their future to CAFOs so a few local “farmers” and outside
corporate investors can benefit economically. The most valuable assets many rural
communities possess are their natural environment and their strong sense of
community. Many are still places with clean air, clean water, open spaces,
scenic landscapes, and opportunities for peace, quiet, and privacy. Many are
still places where people have a sense of belonging, friendly places where
people know and care about each other, where crime rates are low and a strong
sense of safety and security still exists. Such attributes are becoming
increasingly scarce in America,
and thus are becoming increasingly valuable. Rural communities are sacrificing
their futures for CAFOs.

As rural areas become polluted
and their sense of community degraded, they are losing their most precious
future resource, the next generation, as their children leave for the cities
for better opportunities. In fact, rural parents routinely advise their
children to go away to college and get a good education so they won’t have to
return to the rural community or farm for a living. Thankfully, many rural
people are beginning to realize there is no future in turning their communities
into dumping grounds for the rest of society – not for CAFOs or for landfills,
toxic waste incinerators, and prisons. Unfortunately, many just don’t know what
else to do. They have been systematically abused for so long they have come to
accept the degradation as inevitable.

Federal and state governments are
not going to help them; politicians are simply not willing to defy the economic
and political power of the agricultural establishment. Obviously, current
environmental and health regulations are inadequate to protect rural areas, as
seen in repeated and persistently negative health and environmental effects in
areas where CAFOs currently operate under such regulations. So, rural people
are left with no alternative other than to stand up for themselves – for their
basic democratic rights of self-defense and self-determination. Thus far, the
courts have upheld the rights of local communities to pass regulations more
stringent than federal and state laws, when clearly justified for the
protection of public health. The evidence needed to justify local health
ordinances would appear to be compelling. It remains only for people in rural
communities to make compelling cases for local control of CAFOs. Once the
people of rural communities have reclaimed their right to a healthy and clean
environment, they can begin the task of rebuilding an economic, social, and
ecological foundation needed for sustainable
community development. The future opportunities of rural communities are
virtually unlimited as the industrial era draws to a close. The future of rural
communities is in the land and the imagination, creativity, ethics, and honesty
of the people of rural communities, not in soliciting or begging for outside
corporate investments.

In fact, the most important
impact of CAFOs on rural communities may turn out to be that they have sparked
a new rural revolution. The future leadership of rural communities is emerging
today among the opponents of CAFOs. They are learning to organize and to work
together to make a difference in the future of their communities. They
certainly aren’t wining all the battles but they are slowly winning the war. Now
is the time for communities to rise up and reclaim their right to protect their
environment from industrial, corporate agriculture. Now is the time for the
people of rural communities to invest their time, their energy, their
intellect, their money, and their integrity in restoring the health and
productivity of their land and their environment. Now is the time for rural
communities to demand their democratic right to exert local control over CAFOs,
and in so doing, to begin to take control of their own destinies.

[2] Curtis Stofferahn,
“Industrialized Farming and Its Relationship to Community Well-Being: an Update
of the 2000 Report by Linda Labao,” special report prepared for the North Dakota, Office of
Attorney General, http://www.und.edu/org/ndrural/Lobao%20&%20Stofferahn.pdf
(accessed December 2006).